Chapter 5: What if you whack a ball into his face and he loses his front teeth?

We pull up in my dad's grey Audi in front of a very large house. No, this is a mansion. The exterior of the house is amazing. Fountains are displayed in front along with luscious plants and trees.  We walk up the steps of the courtyard, my brothers and I are looking around with wide eyes and open mouths.We walk up the stone steps to the oak front door, my mum rings the doorbell and we wait. I stand behind everyone, looking around at the house's beauty.

"Do you kids really not remember coming here?" Dad asks us. We all shake our heads.

"Dad, did we always wear fancy clothes when we came over here?" Paul asks, huffing and pulling on the bottom of his dress shirt.

"Not really. We used to come over here a lot, but since we're reuniting, we're dressing up," my Dad tells him.

Paul, Lucas and I all mumble to ourselves and sigh. I glare at Dad, since I'm as tall as him with my heels on.

The door swings open and reveals a young, brown haired girl wearing a nice purple dress. "Hello! Come in!" She gestures at us to come in and takes my mum's designer coat, and hangs it on a rack near the door.

"Sarah!" a voice says happily. A spitting image of her daughter, a woman walks in, she has dark curly hair and a button nose, the only difference between the two is their eyes, the young girl's being blue, the mother's brown.

"Michelle!"  my mum runs to greet her and they kiss each other's cheeks - a very French gesture.

"Its lovely to see you again! Nick," she nods to my father and smiles before turning to Paul and Lucas. "Hi kids!"

"This is Lucas, this is Paul," my father pushes them towards Michelle and she hugs them both, still beaming. Something tells me she's always a really smiley person.

"You've both grown up so much!" she smiles at them warmly. "And quite handsome fellows if I do say so myself," she winks. "Where's Natalie?"

"Oh, Nat, she's here," I'm standing behind my Dad and he pushes me forward. I stumble forwards on my heels and try to regain balance.

"Hi," I wave, wobbling on my heels. Her lips part as she looks me up and down.

"Oh honey! You're so beautiful!" she says and I blush before she comes to hug me. "You have beautiful hair! And you're so tall! Where did that small toddler go?"

"Well, Mum forced me into these heels..."

"I know the feeling, darling," she smiles knowingly. "Actually you're probably as tall as Alex. Where is that kid?" she mumbles before calling, "ALEX!" in the direction of the stairs.

"COMING!" he yells back.

"Well, anyway, this is Felecia, she's eleven like you two boys," she pushes Felecia towards them.

"You wanna play a board game?" she asks them.

"Sure," they say simultaneously, shrugging. Felecia smiles and they run off.

"I'm not quite sure where Liam is though," she turns around and searches behind her before ducking into the living room and returning with the cutest toddler I've ever seen. "This is Liam," she holds him on her hip.

"Aw, you didn't tell us you had a third!" Mum says.

"He's one," Michelle tickles his tummy and he giggles. The parents continue talking and I gaze around at the house before me. It's gorgeous, the kind of mansion you'd see in movies. Its colored white inside and has heaps of marble features. Its so fancy that the railings are gold.

I see a girl about my age creeping down the steps in front of me. She glares at me and doesn't stop until she's out the back door, I doubt anyone else noticed. I raise my eyebrows and turn back to the parents before I hear running footsteps from upstairs and I see Alex skipping down the stairs. He's wearing black suit pants and a belt. The buttons of his white dress shirt are undone and he is hurriedly tying a black tie. He finishes the tie as he arrives and I look away from his toned chest when he addresses his mum.

"I'm here!" he tells her.

"Yes, Alex, I know. Now button up that shirt," she orders, rolling her eyes.

He quickly buttons it up and stalks over to my mum and dad. He gives Dad a bro handshake and mum a hug. "Alex, its lovely to see you again," mum tells him, smiling. "You've grown so much!"

He smiles at her before turning his head to me, looking at me up and down. "Yes, so has Natalie," he says, then smirks. I fight the urge to roll my eyes.

"If you two want to go do something before dinner is served in around an hour you can, oh and take Liam," she hands the baby to Alex and he gestures for me to follow him.

I walk up to him when we're out of earshot.

"Hey dude," he says. I grunt and cross my arms, hurrying to keep up. "I was looking at photos of you, of when we were kids-"

"Stalker," I cough.

"-you're certainly a lot different."

"I grew up, you didn't."

"Hey!" he flicks me.

"Ow!" I push his head back and he laughs.

I don't notice where we are going but I find that when we turn a corner we arrive in some sort of a games room. A large cinema screen is displayed on the wall and six reclining chairs surround it. In another corner there is a pool table, there is bean bags every where and different many darts surrounding a dart board. He walks over to a basketball hoop set up on the back wall. He presses some buttons  on the table beside us and the floor we're on spins around and soon we're not in the games room anymore but rather on a full on basketball court.

He looks at my star struck expression. "Pretty cool huh?" he says. I shrug as he walks over to a bag of balls and takes one out. He puts Liam on the floor.

"You're going to leave him on the floor? What if you whack a ball into his face and he loses his front teeth, which he can only get back when he's, like, nine?"

"Where do you suggest we put him then?" he asks me.

"I dunno," I search the room for somewhere to put the toddler. I take off my high heels and pick up Liam. I walk up the stairs to what I suppose is a gym and place him on a massaging chair. Alex appears behind me and drags the chair to the railing that overlooks the court.

I roll my eyes at him. "What? He can't miss all the action!" he says and I sigh as we walk back down the stairs.

"You wanna know why I chose this sport?"

"No."

He looks at me for a few seconds before continuing. "Ok then," he bounces the ball into the center and loosens his tie.

"Aw, sweetie, you're getting all serious," I say.

"I know we're practically married bro, but I think sweetie is pretty over used... by fifty year old women."

"Its what fifty year old women call children," I tell him.

"Aw, you think I'm cute?" he says, bouncing the ball from hand to hand.

"Not all children are cute, honey, some are the most ugly things on the planet, they're also the most annoying, stupid and chaotic people."

"You're the stupid one dude, you banged into me!"

I roll my eyes. "What does that even mean?"

"It means I'd be the one calling you babe if you hadn't."

"Then I'm glad I did bang into you."

"Harsh mate, you're good."

"Can we please just play Alex?"

"Sure Greg."

"Greg?" I ask.

"Yeah, you're quite obviously a guy so your name's Greg."

"Ok Patricia."

"Game on bruh."

He bounces the ball and runs full speed towards the hoop. I quickly take the ball off him and jog up the court, moving the ball away from him when he tries to intercept it. I score a goal and Liam claps. He must be used to this.

"Nat! Nat! Nat!" he cheers, clapping.

"See, your brother is on my side," I grin and turn to Alex, who stares at me with an open mouth and wide eyes.

"You... how? What? You - you're wearing a long dress!" he stutters, breathing heavily and gesturing at me and the court.

"Sexist woman," I grab the ball out of his hands and bounce it up to the center circle. A good twenty minutes later the score is 3-17 to me. Sucker. Alex bounces the ball up to the circle and glares at me.

"You don't even stink Greg!" he says.

"You smelt me?" I laugh.

"Well, at least not any worse than you already do," he smirks at me.

"Ew, you actually smelt me Patricia," I say.

"Your stench is far to overwhelming," he smirks. "Its hard not to pick up on it."

"I thought you just said I didn't stink?" I roll my eyes and run forward, taking the ball with me and scoring another try. Liam claps.

Alex plucks the ball off me and dribbles it back. Just as he turns around his phone rings in his pocket. He answers it and starts talking to his mum before he hangs up.

"Dude, can you go get Liam?" he says.

"Yes, lazy butt," I walk up the stairs and pick up Liam and bring him back downstairs.

"Nat, Nat, Nat!" he screams and chews my hair. I smile at him and tickle him before something occurs to me.

"Hey Alex," he looks up from his phone and raises one handsome eyebrow. "How does Liam know my name?"

He looks down and scratches his neck. "Ah, Mum probably was telling him your names. Lets go."

We walk to his hoop and he clicks some buttons until we're back in the games room. Felecia, Paul and Lucas are all there, playing Xbox. I decide I like this girl.

"C'mon sis, dinner's ready," the three eleven year olds dash off and take Liam with them.

Alex throws an arm around me and I immediately shove it off.

"Get off me babe."

"Why do you call me babe? I mean, I know you wanna be my girlfriend, everyone does, but seriously I'm way to good for you," he smirks and I shove him away again.

"Girls call their friends babe."

"I didn't think you'd be one of those girls."

"Maybe I am."

"I hope you're not."

"And why is that?"

"Because I'm tired of the barbie dolls."

"They aren't just barbie dolls, cupcake, the girl that crept out tonight looked like Nicki Minaj."

He shrugs. "I like those Nicki Minaj girls."

"Ok...Ew, Patricia."

"But you look great in black."

"Double ew. Black is emo and funeral color, honey."

"So who died?"

"What?"

"I mean, you're wearing black and you don't look like and emo, so it must be a funeral."

I laugh at him and he smiles. Its a beautiful smile that lights up his dark blue eyes and shows his white teeth.

I look away. "What's for dinner?"

"I dunno."

We descend into an awkward silence before we both speak at the same time.

"Why did you call me dude?" I say.

"Have you ever done modeling?"

"What?" we both say at the same time. "You go first," we say in sync again before glaring at each other and shutting up, waiting for the other person to say something.

"Why did you call me dude?" I say.

"Oh... Because when I bumped into you I thought you were a boy?"

"Why?"

"Oh, Sherlock Holmes now are we Greg?"

I roll my eyes. "Answer the question, honey."

"Ok, ok. Well, I kinda thought you were an emo, because you were wearing a hoodie..."

"Girls can be emos."

"Meh, I associate emos with boys."

"You're so sexist Patricia."

"And you're so sensitive Greg," he smirks at me.

"What'd you say before?"

"Oh, yeah. Have you modeled before?"

"What?"

"Have you ever, you know posed for a camera for like, magazines or something? Its called modelling, bro," he shrugs.

"Um, no! Why would I ?"

"Because you get money? And lots of it."

"Yeah, but I don't think I'd be fit to model."

He looks me up and down and scoffs. "Sure."

I narrow my eyes at him. "Why'd you ask, Patricia?"

"Well, this company I do it for-"

"You do it?"

"Well, of course, a pretty babe like me couldn't pass up the opportunity. Everyone wants my face on billboards."

I roll my eyes. "Yeah, so? You where saying?"

"Anyway, this company I model for asked if I knew someone that could do it with me," he runs a hand through his hair. I raise my eyebrows. "Iwaswonderingifyouwantedtogotoashootwithme."

"I'm sorry I couldn't quite hear you."

"Would you come to a shoot with me?"

"No."

I quicken my pace and he spins me around.

"Come on Nat, I don't know anyone else!"

"I'm sure you can find someone that works for your studio that is a model."

"Well, they're all kinda annoying and throw themselves all over me!"

"And why do you think I wouldn't?"

"Did you actually just say that?"

"Ok, I probably wouldn't... But they're probably more experienced and stuff."

"Please, they'd pay you heaps."

"No!"

"Why not?"

"Because.... I don't want my face like, somewhere, getting judged by strangers!"

"But Nat! They'd only make nice judgments, you're so pretty!"

I blush and look down. "Was that a compliment Patricia?"

"No. I'm just saying that they wouldn't be mean, Americans are nice," I raise my eyebrows at him. "Most Americans," he corrects.

"Sure."

"Come on Nat!"

"I don't even know you though!"

He shrugs.

"Why don't you just take Amanda or someone?"

"Amanda? Why would I take Amanda?"

"Because she's, pretty and popular?"

"Models don't have to be popular!"

"Aren't models supposed to be popular though?"

"No!"

"Then why're you one?" I push past him as he scoffs. I trot off in my high heels before I turn around. "This house is to big. Where're we going?"

He chuckles and takes my arm. "This way."

***

We arrive in the dining room and sit down opposite each other.

"So what'd you guys do?" Michelle sits down and we all dig into the roast chicken laid on the table.

"We went to play basketball," Alex says through a mouthful of food, earning a glare from his mum.

"What'd Liam do?"

"He watched."

"Who won?" his dad, Jackson, asks. Jackson has the same blue eyes of all his children. But apart  from that, all three of them look extremely similar to their mother.

"Natalie," Alex says quietly.

"Who?" Jackson holds a hand to his ear, smirking.

"Natalie."

"Good on you darl," Jackson says. Of course Patricia is, I mentally roll my eyes. Suddenly Alex sits up, his eyes brightening, swallowing his food.

"Hey Mum? Natalie said she'd like to do the modelling gig with me," he says confidently. I drop my fork and my mouth drops open as I stare at him, his mouth turned up into a smirk.

"What? I-I didn't-"

"Oh yes! Nat should definitely do it! When is it Michelle?" my mum just has to ask.

Michelle and Mum start exchanging the details of the photo-shoot. I draw my foot back and kick Alex's leg.

"OUCH!" he yelps.

Everyone turns to look at him as I continue eating, smirking. He glares at me as everyone goes back to their previous conversation.

"Stomach pains," he grins, clutching his stomach.

"I hate you Patricia," I mouth at him.

"I love you too Greg," he mouths back, making a kissing shape with his mouth, still hunch over, so that he looks like an alpaca sneezing.

I roll my eyes.

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Sorry, this chapter was really bad. I SWEAR, IT WILL GET BETTER, JUST KEEP READING! PLEEAASEE!